Lucien's text echoes. I hold up a black cocktail dress Gabriel insisted I buy for a museum gala. It's beautiful—structured, expensive, elegant. And it makes me feel like Gabriel's wife, which is exactly the opposite of powerful.
I shove it back into the closet and pull out another option: deep burgundy, simpler cut, something I chose myself during one of those Tuesday afternoons Gabriel interrogated me about. He'd hated it. Said burgundy made me look like I was trying too hard.
I hold it up to the light. It's not trying too hard. It's just trying.
I hang it on the outside of the closet door. Friday's armor is chosen.
The rest of the week passes in the kind of rhythm that looks normal from outside. Wednesday: foundation work, grant review, phone calls with potential attorneys. Thursday: therapy check-in with Dr. Cross via video call because she had a scheduling conflict. She asks how I'm doing. I say fine. She sees through it but doesn't push, just reminds me we have our regular session tomorrow.
Friday arrives with rain. Not the violent storm that killed Gabriel, just persistent September drizzle that makes the city look smudged. I dress for therapy in jeans and a sweater, comfortable clothes that signal I'm off-duty from performing.
Dr. Cross's office is in The Crest, occupying the third floor of a renovated brownstone. The waiting room is designed to feel calming—soft lighting, neutral colors, and a white noise machine that masks whatever's being discussed behind Dr. Cross's closed door.
I sit in the chair closest to the door because Gabriel trained me to always know my exits, and five months of therapy hasn't untrained that particular survival instinct.
At exactly 2 PM, Dr. Cross opens her door. She's in her late forties, graying hair worn in a practical bob, and glasses that make her look both stern and kind. "Lana. Come in."
Her office is familiar territory now. The same chair I always sit in—leather, comfortable, positioned to face her without feeling interrogated. The same box of tissues on the side table that I've needed more often than I'd like. The same view of the street where rain is turning everything gray.
"How have you been?" she asks, settling into her chair with a notepad she rarely writes in but always brings.
"Complicated." I pull my knees up, wrap my arms around them—a posture she's told me indicates I'm protecting myself."I went to an art exhibition last week. Dark romance, trauma recovery, themes of confinement and liberation. It was... a lot."
"Tell me about it."
So I do. I describe Vera Molina's work, the photograph of the terrace, the way my memory fractured when I looked atThe Drop. I tell her about Elias Voss asking what I saw and somehow making honesty feel possible. About fleeing through the emergency exit because staying felt dangerous.
Dr. Cross listens without interrupting, her face revealing nothing. When I finish, she asks, "What made it feel dangerous?"
"Being seen. Being understood. Someone looking at my reaction to that photograph and recognizing what it meant." I press my forehead to my knees. "Gabriel spent five years making sure no one really saw me. And now I'm in this club where I feel constantly visible, constantly assessed, and I can't tell if that's healing or just recreating familiar trauma with better lighting."
"The Dominion," she says. "You've mentioned it before. The exclusive club where this Lucien Armitage invited you."
"Yes."
"And you're going back. To a dinner tonight."
"Yes."
"Why?"
It's the question I've been avoiding. "Because staying home feels like disappearing. Because uncomfortable is at least honest. Because maybe if I keep exposing myself to situations where I have to be present, eventually I'll remember how."
"Or?" Dr. Cross prompts gently.
"Or I'll break trying."
She sets down her notepad, leans forward slightly. "Lana, we've talked about the difference between challengingyourself and punishing yourself. Exposure therapy works when you're gradually building tolerance to manageable discomfort. But what you're describing—going to a club where you feel constantly watched, attending events that trigger your trauma, seeking out situations that make you feel the way Gabriel made you feel—that's not building tolerance. That's seeking out pain."
"What if pain is the only thing that makes me feel real?"
The words surprise both of us. I didn't plan to say them. They just emerged, honest and terrible.
Dr. Cross doesn't look shocked. She looks sad. "Pain makes you feel something. That's different from feeling real. Your nervous system is so used to threat that safety feels like numbness. So you're creating artificial threat to feel alive again."
"So what do I do? Stay in my apartment forever? Only go to work and therapy and nowhere else?"
"You find middle ground. You challenge yourself in ways that don't replicate your trauma." She pauses. "Tell me about Lucien Armitage. What do you know about him?"
